


The Rise of Hanal'Ghilan

by Little_Mothrid



Series: What Once was Lost [1]
Category: Dragon Age (Comics), Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II, Dragon Age: Inquisition, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Arlathan (Dragon Age), F/M, Pre-Dragon Age II, Pre-Dragon Age: Inquisition, Pre-Dragon Age: Inquisition - Trespasser DLC, Pre-Dragon Age: Origins, Pre-Games, Romance, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-16
Updated: 2020-07-31
Packaged: 2021-03-04 22:48:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25304047
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Little_Mothrid/pseuds/Little_Mothrid
Summary: Fen'Harel wasn't always a trickster god. He was once an innocent child, lost in a world shrouded in fire and death struggling to survive. She was the purest of The Originals, offering her guidance to those in need of it.
Relationships: Cremisius "Krem" Aclassi/Female Lavellan, Cullen Rutherford/Female Warden, Dagna/Sera (Dragon Age), Fen'Harel | Solas/Original Female Character(s), Iron Bull/Dorian Pavus
Series: What Once was Lost [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1832947
Comments: 4
Kudos: 10





	1. Prequel

The world is alive with light around me. It flows and pulses with the heart and breath of the Fade. Waves of pure magic dance through the air; fracturing this light into infinite fractals coloring our world in hues of green, violet, and gold. We are one and the same with the physical. The Fade itself crystallizes and floats on the wind. Trees soar high above; enveloping us in their glittering arms, holding the knowledge of the ages. All who live know only life and health.

I dance and sing through millennia, giving my unique guidance to those in need of it. Emotions flow through and magnify within me so that I may follow their trail to the Elvhen. I am but a wisp, a whisper, a being only visible on the edge of your vision. No one can hold me, capture me, or recognize me unless I make myself known. Albeit I am not the first of my kind, but I am one of the few Originals. Fear, Rage, Greed, Desire, and Joy all came before me. I am one holding their chosen, a mother holding her newborn, a young elf seeing their friend in a new light for the first time, two friends captured in a moment only understood by them, an elder teaching the next generation, a young child helping a creature in need. I am one of the purest of The Originals. I came before Mythal and Elghar’nain materialized in their original forms. Before they became flesh and created The People. Before the rise of Arlathan. I am ancient and unyielding. I am Love.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For early access and other amazing exclusive content, check out my Patreon!   
> https://www.patreon.com/littlemothrid


	2. Din'Anshiral

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The life Solas has known is destroyed around him and as a young child he witnesses the death of all he loves as he escapes to safety.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow this was out of my comfort zone but I'm pretty proud of it! Expect longer chapters in the future.

The smell of flesh burns my eyes as I run. I must run. I must keep running. The heat of Elghar’nain’s fire leaves blisters on my back as it burns all I’ve known to ash around me. Why did they protect me? Why did the risk their lives for me? Bodies are falling around me as I run. I can feel their dreams die out with their screams. Everything hurts. Ragged breaths and coughs escaping my throat are drowned out by the roar of the fire. My small footsteps are muffled by the blood pooling in the streets. Don’t slip. I can’t slip. Don’t make their sacrifices for nothing.  
The library implodes sending cinders and shrapnel in the air. A large splinter lodges itself in my shoulder, sending me to the ground. “Mamae! Ma halani, Mamae!” I cry as I slip on the cobblestones. I freeze as I lock eyes with the empty gaze of a young boy I called my friend. I remembered the countless hours we spent in that library. He had just been accepted as an apprentice. I vomit the porridge I had eaten that morning and rise with the conviction to keep going. He can’t have died for nothing. I must keep going. I can no longer tell if my tear blurred vision is from grief or smoke. It’s getting harder to breathe.

  
As I rise, I realize that my ankle is most likely sprained. Tapping into my core, healing magic floods to the area stabilizing it enough to keep going to safety. The woods are so far. Someone grabs my arm and begins dragging me. I struggle against them. It has to be one of Elghar’nain’s arcane warriors. In blind panic, I send out a mind blast. I must survive. I can’t be captured or else everything would have been for nothing. The years of hiding and lies. All of the slaughter and destruction. All for nothing. My captor redirects my mind blast as if they knew it was coming and continue to drag me towards the forest. Wait, why are they dragging me to the forest and not to Him? The taste of blood invades my mouth as I realize I’m coughing from screaming and not just smoke. They stop, gripping me by my shoulders and force me to face them.

  
“Dadae!” I cry out as my body goes limp against them in relief and my body is wracked with sobs.

  
“Can you run! Da’len you can’t stop!” he yells above the roaring and the screams. Before I can answer he looks me over and gathers me in his arms and wraps me in his wolf pelt as if I’m no more than a young child. He runs faster than my small legs could ever carry me towards our safety. We pass the textile shop; its once vibrant, glittering fabrics and crystalline dome now nothing more than smoldering ash and shards littering the street. The once great spires and monuments of our town look like the grizzled ribs of a dragon piercing the shifting black sky. Bodies are impaled on rooftops and intestines strung up on lampposts as if marking a holiday. The gore and faces of those I loved are too much for me to bear so I hide my face on his protective shoulder.

  
“Don’t turn away from this, Solas. Know their horrors and what they do. Hate them and never forget this day”, my father says to me. I can hear the choked sobs in his voice as he attempts to hold back his own tears. The loud pop and flash of a fade step makes my world freeze in slow motion as we crash to the ground. I don’t dare to move as an arcane warrior flashes away after digging his spectral blade into the throat of my father. He somehow hadn’t noticed me. I stay there, crushed by the weight of the man who was my world, staring into his eyes and feeling him drift into nothing. My arm is definitely broken from his weight and the fall.

  
“Ir abelas, Dadae! Ir abelas!”, I begin keening relentlessly but no one can hear me over the massacre of my unarmed village. This is too much. I’m alone. I have no one. Everyone is dead. The screaming won’t stop. His blood and the blood of countless others pooling in the street lubricates me enough to move out from underneath him. Cradling my arm, I run faster than before towards the trees that were my only symbols of hope. Probing my core, I find comfort and relief that I have enough mana to fade step. Confident that the chaos and flashes from the arcane warriors will mask me at this point, I begin rapidly stepping to my freedom. Using the ever-shifting shadows from the flames and the plumes of smoke from the bodies, I finally escape my destroyed home.

  
The trees welcome me in their silver arms and seemingly shift to protect me from view. I can’t stop yet. I must get to the safe-house Mamae and Dadae built for us when my abilities first presented themselves seven years ago. I was no more than four years old when they discovered me to be a Dreamer. I don’t stop stepping until my mana finally diminishes and I can no longer breathe. I collapse in ragged coughs against a large ironwood tree and begin to lose consciousness when a small pink haze dances against the edges of my vision. Before I can focus on what it could be, everything goes dark as my body succumbs to exhaustion.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For early access and other amazing exclusive content, check out my Patreon!  
> https://www.patreon.com/littlemothrid


	3. Ma Ghilana mir Din’an

Something has shifted. The once idle spirits have erupted in a maelstrom of Fury, Terror, and Despair. What has happened? This area of Arlathan has always been so peaceful. Spotting a cluster of Rage and Terror demons, I begin to follow them through the ancient forest I call my domain.

By tapping into the shared consciousness of the Fade, I can see flashes of what is transpiring in a small village that has dedicated its existence to the preservation and discovery of knowledge. What was once a place of education and peace was now under siege by Elghar’nain’s arcane warriors and various demons attracted to the carnage. Ironwood branches phase through me as I rapidly make my way forward through the forest. Demons lustfully cry out in anticipation for the emotional feast and carnage that lays in wait for them to devour. Projecting my consciousness into ones in the midst of the massacre, violent images of demons growing fat from the consumption of energy and Elvhen alike in gluttonous revelry fill my mind. Their terror and anguish become increasingly overwhelming the closer I get to the village. If there are some I can guide away, some poor souls I can save even if it’s a last comfort, I must be there for them in this time of need.

As the site of the one-sided battle draws ever closer, I become able to feel each soul as it slips into the ebbing and flowing energy of the Fade. Black smoke and living flame dance upward, caressing and tearing at the once placid sky like the touch of an abusive lover. Childrens’ screams for their protectors die in their throats as they are taken from their physical existence. Bond-mates keen holding the lifeless vessels of their life partners, their hearts tearing themselves apart in their chests from the anguish of the eternity they had in front of them swept away by the glowing blades of arcane warriors. Someone. I must save at least one! I rush into the throng of carnage, flitting from one elvhen to the next only to be intercepted by demons at every attempt as they move in to feast on their growing anguish.

Finally, at long last, I am able to place my spectral hand on one child. They lay at the base of the once great stone staircase that lead to their most sacred place of knowledge. The spirits of Wisdom had long fled their dwelling by this time, but his spirit still clings desperately to its vessel. I cast a shimmering pink barrier around us so that I may do my work uninterrupted by the lesser fear demons that have come to pick at his remains. Touching his core, I see his most cherished memories flash and spark like fireflies over a pond throughout my being. Memories of his father teaching him to read, his mother holding him after the loss of the young bird he was nurturing, the mischief he would pull in the library with his dearest friend, and the joy of being taken on for a long awaited apprenticeship all float through me in small, playful orbs of light float through my translucent form. I gently delve into the pond and feel all the good he has done and experienced during his short existence. The feeling of joy, excitement, comfort, and love flood and overtake where what was held in the claws of grief, pain, and terror. I need not speak words as I comfort him with these memories. At last his spirit calms into serenity and slips from his body into the comfort of the Fade. He has joined his loved ones and will no longer be plagued by the fear he held before his last moments. My work here is finished, and I must move on.

The veil drops around me and the cluster of demons disperses at the loss of their innocent meal. The one question that will not abandon me is why this is happening. This village has always been one of peace. They were sanctioned to collect and preserve knowledge for the ruling Evanuris. There are many other villages dedicated to funneling warriors into the armies of their patrons, providing food for the empire, or simply being playgrounds to placate the ever-changing whims of whichever Evanuris claimed them as a part of their lands. Not this one. This one was neutral and untouched by their grasping talons. It was one of the final few whom were protected under their extensive treaties and unsaid agreements. To attack this place of knowledge was to declare war on all other members of the pantheon.

“Find the dreamer! Find the one they hid from us! Kill every elf who crosses your path”, booms the voice of Elghar’nain as he stands on a pillar of fire high above the once glittering spires.

Why would Elghar’nain do such a thing as lead his armies into a massacre on the people of this place? He may be the Patriarch, but even he is not above such an unforgivable crime with nothing to gain and everything to lose. Their screams along with the joyous laughter if soldiers and gleeful shrieks of demonic hordes are becoming deafening. The terror and bloodlust flood around me as I fight in anguish to keep them at bay. It’s too much. They’re corrupting me into a monstrous form, and I am filled with terror. Not me! I cannot lose myself to this. I have fought against the taint for too long to succumb to it now!

The emotions of a father holding his young son to his chest, cloaked from view in a thick wolf pelt, as he frantically runs past where I stand breaks me out of my inner turmoil and forces the corrupting energy at bay. His overwhelming emotions of love and the desperate need to protect his son fill me once again with a renewed vigor and set me with determination. This one. This is the one I must protect at all costs. Before I am able to reach them, the father is cut down by one of Elghar’nain’s many warriors. However, I and the many demons are still able to feel the energy of the son he gave his life to try to protect.

With renewed speed, I rush forward manipulating the fade around me in an attempt to reach the child in time. I pour my reserves into the boy and give him the strength to overcome the pain in his frail body, pry himself from underneath his father, and stand tall once again. A barrier now envelops a small area around him and follows him as he breaks for the tree line away from those sent to end his and his loved ones’ lives. Guiding his feet, he runs with sureness unhindered by the blood-slickened pavers in the street or the scattered limbs of countless Elvhen. Pouring my energy into his core, his reserves do not deplete as he rapidly zips through pockets of the fade to the freedom and safety of the forest. Once he is out of danger, I swear by my existence that he will not be harmed in this way again. He is mine, and he will know love.

**Author's Note:**

> This is the Prequel of a 5 work series. There are 5 books currently timelined at 200-300k+ words per book. Please bear with me and enjoy the ride!


End file.
